Video of a camera repairman in Milan
This is Gian Luigi Carminati, a 76-year-old camera repairman in Milan who has spent about 60 years fixing and refurbishing film cameras in a small shop. No doubt he's got some good gems in his store. I'd love to visit this place.
Celebrate the 50th anniversary of NYC Landmarks Law with these photos of the former Penn Station
Last night, the Empire State Building lit up in the New York State's flag colors of orange, white, and blue to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the NYC Landmarks Law. The law was put into place after the destruction of the former Penn Station as a means to assure people that historic structures and significant landmarks pertaining to NYC history don't disappear just because somebody comes around with a handful of money.
Over the last 50 years, the NYC Landmarks Law has defined entire neighborhoods and saved precious buildings from demolition and destruction (or alteration from its original form). It is just one of the ways NYC preserves its history when so much else is changing in the city. See this map here for all the places saved over the years.
What Happened To The 9-Year-Old Smoking In Mary Ellen Mark's Photo?
This is an oldie but a goodie. After the death of famed photographer Mary Ellen Mark last year, NPR did some digging to see where the subject of one of her most famous photographs -- a portrait of a 9-year-old girl smoking titled Amanda and her cousin Amy -- was today.
That girl's full name is Amanda Marie Ellison (and the girl behind her is Amy Minton Velasquez). She lives in Lenoir, N.C. and remembers Mary Ellen Mark very well. Amanda was chosen at the time as one of the subjects in a series done through Life magazine about project children in North Carolina. As you can probably guess, Amanda grew up in a troubled home with bad influences at every angle. That was all captured in this famous photograph that encapsulates Mary Ellen Mark's ability to tell stories through images and capture horror, beauty, and surprise through the lens.
The Corbis-Bettmann Photo Archives are stored in a former underground limestone mine in PA
What an incredibly fascinating video about image archiving. The Corbis-Bettmann Archives sits inside a former limestone mine in Pennsylvania. The site is known as Iron Mountain and it houses a number of other archiving and storage needs for companies around the world (the company also specializes in data destruction in case you don't need something saved forever).
Video tour of the Springfield Underground.
The location, inside a mountain and underground, reminds me a lot of Kraft's Springfield Underground facility where the Kraft company stores excess cheese and other product. The New Yorker did a wonderful piece about Iron Mountain back in 2013 talking about the facilities "spookiness" and silent operation and how Iron Mountain actually housed fallout shelters for VIPs in case certain people needed to hide out and be protected. Weird!
But back to this original video above! The Carnegie Museum of Art commissioned this video piece to show just how Corbis maintains the Bettmann archives. I would love to visit this place -- if that's even allowed.